Gina-Marie CheesemanCalifornia Governor’s Healthcare Proposal
December 29th 2007 03:14
California’s Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger healthcare proposal, recently passed in the California Assembly, requires all California residents to have a minimum level of health insurance coverage. State health care programs such as Medi-Cal and Healthy Programs will be expanded to cover low income residents, and financial assistance will be available to lower-income residents. Health insurance companies will be required to guarantee coverage regardless of pre-existing health conditions. Limits will be placed on how much companies can charge for coverage.
Critics doubt that California can afford to undertake Schwarzenegger’s proposal. Arnold King, adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute doubts California is a “good position” to be undertaking Schwarzenegger’s proposal. He points out that California is “Ground Zero for the coming collapse in housing market values. The state needs to be very sure that its fiscal house is in order.”
“Raising taxes on tobacco implies hitching this new program to an unstable and declining revenue source,” said Rio Grande Foundation president Paul Gessing. “Mandating that employers spend between 1 and 6.5 percent of their payroll costs on health care will only chase businesses out of the state or force them to pass additional costs on to Californians. Neither method provides a sound foundation for a program designed to serve 3.6 million people,” he continued.
Grace-Marie Turner, president of the Galen Institute, said, “California’s latest health reform plan is nothing more than a shell game that will put more and more of the state’s health sector under political control. It would not achieve the governor’s goal of universal coverage and in the process would rob employers, health care providers, citizens, and insurers of their flexibility and freedom. It surely will be rejected by the voters.”
“The new plan developed by Governor Schwarzenegger and Speaker Nunez to extend health insurance to 3.6 million uninsured Californians will not necessarily insure that they receive timely quality medical care,” Robert Berry, M.D. of the PATMOS EmergiClinic said.
Berry continued, “There will be more patients requiring more visits from the same number of doctors, while increasing cost by producing more bureaucrats who don’t provide direct patient care. It is time to try a new approach that levels the playing field of tax treatment for all health care, thus promoting more direct payment for everyday medical care and reducing cost.”
Stephen Entin, president and executive director of the Institute for Research on the Economics of Taxation, blasts the healthcare proposal. “The California health plan sounds like a tax on the poor (who smoke disproportionately), young workers, and small businesses,” he said. “Low-income workers will be forced to use a large part of their limited compensation for insurance and taxes. With a high minimum wage preventing cuts in cash payments to cover the mandate, employers will have to lay people off, and workers may be forced to work in the underground economy, go on unemployment, or move to Nevada,” Entin continued.
Critics doubt that California can afford to undertake Schwarzenegger’s proposal. Arnold King, adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute doubts California is a “good position” to be undertaking Schwarzenegger’s proposal. He points out that California is “Ground Zero for the coming collapse in housing market values. The state needs to be very sure that its fiscal house is in order.”
“Raising taxes on tobacco implies hitching this new program to an unstable and declining revenue source,” said Rio Grande Foundation president Paul Gessing. “Mandating that employers spend between 1 and 6.5 percent of their payroll costs on health care will only chase businesses out of the state or force them to pass additional costs on to Californians. Neither method provides a sound foundation for a program designed to serve 3.6 million people,” he continued.
Grace-Marie Turner, president of the Galen Institute, said, “California’s latest health reform plan is nothing more than a shell game that will put more and more of the state’s health sector under political control. It would not achieve the governor’s goal of universal coverage and in the process would rob employers, health care providers, citizens, and insurers of their flexibility and freedom. It surely will be rejected by the voters.”
“The new plan developed by Governor Schwarzenegger and Speaker Nunez to extend health insurance to 3.6 million uninsured Californians will not necessarily insure that they receive timely quality medical care,” Robert Berry, M.D. of the PATMOS EmergiClinic said.
Berry continued, “There will be more patients requiring more visits from the same number of doctors, while increasing cost by producing more bureaucrats who don’t provide direct patient care. It is time to try a new approach that levels the playing field of tax treatment for all health care, thus promoting more direct payment for everyday medical care and reducing cost.”
Stephen Entin, president and executive director of the Institute for Research on the Economics of Taxation, blasts the healthcare proposal. “The California health plan sounds like a tax on the poor (who smoke disproportionately), young workers, and small businesses,” he said. “Low-income workers will be forced to use a large part of their limited compensation for insurance and taxes. With a high minimum wage preventing cuts in cash payments to cover the mandate, employers will have to lay people off, and workers may be forced to work in the underground economy, go on unemployment, or move to Nevada,” Entin continued.
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